The idea to start a community owned grocery store in Bloomington, Illinois began in late 2011. By March of 2012, a community meeting of over 100 people decided to move forward with creating Green Top Grocery, a grocery co-op collectively owned by its customers, suppliers, and broader Bloomington community. Three years later, in May of 2015, after working tirelessly to gather enough grant money, Green Top Grocery opened its doors for business. Today, Green Top Grocery is a fully operational grocery store with over 2,500 member owners. Green Top prioritizes ordering local and organic products in an effort to make healthy food more accessible in their community.
Over the course of the year you’ll find hundreds of local products on the shelves, sourced from over 50 Illinois-based suppliers. During peak growing season, the co-op’s produce department is like shopping at the local farmers’ market. Fruits and vegetables from 15 local farms are delivered throughout the week, providing fresh quality produce for the community.
Earlier this year Bryce Skinner joined Green Top as their new Produce Manager. The first thing she noticed was that there wasn't a centralized way to communicate with their 50+ local suppliers. Searching through emails or notes in a folder was time consuming and error prone. Bryce found herself receiving emails from farmers with missing information which led to a lot of unnecessary back-and-forth. A lack of clear communication regarding product availability and consistency often made it difficult to place accurate orders.
In August of this year, National Co-op Grocers (NCG) held their annual Focus on Fresh conference in Minneapolis. It was here that Bryce was introduced to Local Line.“When I saw the Local Line platform in action. I immediately recognized the value. Everything is consolidated in one place, and the platform prioritizes simplicity. Ordering from a vendor is as simple as selecting a delivery date and adding items to the cart, and this was exactly what Green Top needed."
When she arrived back to work, Bryce began implementing Local Line with help of our customer support team. We identified the best suppliers to start with and got to work onboarding them. “Local Line even reached out to my suppliers to expedite the process. There was no cost to them and the setup was very fast. Within seven days of getting started, I was able to place my first order and start receiving deliveries.”, says Bryce.
As Local Line became part of Bryce’s daily routine, she began saving significant amounts of time. She was previously dedicating much of her day to managing orders, leaving little time to complete other important tasks on the floor with customers. Local Line has allowed her to devote more time creating displays, improving signage, and assisting customers. She was even able to reorganize the produce wet wall to optimize flow and energy efficiency, a task that had previously been on the back burner.
Local Line has been able to improve Green Top Grocery is other unexpected areas like food waste. As Bryce explains, “another challenge I used to face was wasting too much local produce due to poor communication and inconsistent ordering. With Local Line, I can now place more precise orders, which has allowed me to better monitor inventory and make more informed decisions about what to order next.”
Thanks to Local Line, Green Top Grocery has streamlined its produce department operations, improving communication with local farmers and ensuring that fresh, high-quality products are consistently available to the community. By reducing inefficiencies, Bryce has not only saved time but has also been able to focus on further enhancing the customer experience, contributing to the co-op’s growth. As Green Top continues to prioritize local and sustainable sourcing, their partnership with Local Line demonstrates the power of innovation and collaboration in supporting local food systems.
“Local Line is dedicated to helping businesses like ours access local suppliers more easily. They’ve provided ongoing support every step of the way and regularly check in to ensure everything is running smoothly. Their commitment has made me feel like a priority, which translates into my own dedication to making Green Top’s operations more efficient.”
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